


The Closed System

by ObservationMuted



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen, Holmes Brothers' Childhood, Mycroft-centric, POV Third Person, Sherlock-centric, Taking artistic license with "dismanteling Moriarty's network"
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-08
Updated: 2015-07-22
Packaged: 2018-04-03 11:20:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4099150
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ObservationMuted/pseuds/ObservationMuted
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is Mycroft Holmes who says "sentiment is a chemical defect found in the losing side."</p><p>It is Sherlock Holmes who says "caring is not an advantage."</p><p>They take each others words as gospel. Over the years it saves and damns them both.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The boy simply knows it as hope, and it waits in his bloodstream.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock Holmes, birth through age ten. Mycroft Holmes, age seven through seventeen.

Mycroft Holmes learns solitude in the seven years before Sherlock is born.

He begins to map out a life for himself, taking knowledge from textbooks marked for older children. His mother teaches him at the kitchen table, notebook paper, pens, crosswords, reference books and the daily newspaper scattered across the worktop until it was time to make lunch. 

Sherlock's birth shifts everything just a fraction to the left of center.

The oldest Holmes brother has never met a child quite like himself, and he doubts that he will. Still, if ever there were a child like him... well, that child would likely be the dark haired bright eyed boy his parents have just introduced him to. Balance of probability dictates it. Thought that is not what the seven year old version of Mycroft Holmes thinks.

At seven, Mycroft is too young to think of sentiment as a weakness. The boy simply knows it as hope, and it waits in his bloodstream.

...

Sherlock is homeschooled, though Mycroft begins reading books with his brother in the house's small study long before their mother calls Sherlock for his first lesson.

He has already read all of the books in the house, but now he is counting down the days until he leaves. Boarding school is in his future.

...

Sherlock is seven, Mycroft fourteen.

The first of many growth spurts have left Mycroft able to see clearly over Sherlock's head. There is an open suitcase on the floor of Mycroft'so bedroom. The youngest Holmes brother refuses to knock, on principal. However, he also refuses to enter Mycroft's bedroom for the same reason. 

"You have weeks before term starts." Sherlock says, his sock-clad feet are carefully pressed to the edge of the threshold, arms crossed and voice flat.

Mycroft doesn't tell Sherlock that he hasn't finished packing. It is obvious. Instead he takes a breath and holds it in his lungs. Waits.

...

It is two days before the start of term.

The eldest Holmes brother zips his suitcase closed, turns to face the window, and listens. Sherlock knocks on the doorjam, even though the door is open. Mycroft turns to face his brother just as Sherlock enters the room.

The smallest suitcase in the house sits closed on top of the bed. Mycroft has left his cupboard door open. He watches Sherlock's focus catch on these details and he holds back a smile.

Mycroft Holmes spent seven years learning solitude. Then Sherlock came into his life like a variable, unknown and unpredictable... and Mycroft waited, hope in his veins, for the equation to solve itself. 

The ways they balance each other out are complicated, Mycroft knows. But he's solved it once, this version of them. Sherlock has given him enough data to make a theory. Mycroft has guided and explained and tested and observed enough to know that if ever there was someone like him, it could only be Sherlock.

The hope in his veins crystallized with the knowledge that they would part ways.

"Mycroft." Sherlock stood, clad in mis-matched socks and a jumper several sizes too large. The sleeves had been pushed up.

"Sherlock." Mycroft spared a glance at his brother's socks.

There was a pause. Sherlock ran a hand through unruly hair. Mycroft waits. Allows a few more heartbeats of time to pass (sentiment.)

"Deduce me." Mycroft's voice is even, warm.

It catches Sherlock unaware, as it's meant to. They have played variations on the deduction game often, but never have they deduced the other. Mycroft wants to pry that apart, gut out it's reasoning and tack the findings on a corkboard. 

"You didn't pack your best clothes, and you took the smallest case we've got in the house." Sherlock hesitates, refuses to look Mycroft in the eye.

"Obvious, go further." Mycroft watches his brother blink quickly, trying to hide his shock at the critical response.

"You wanted to leave me the suits, but I am still much too small for them. You left the cupboard door open so I would steal your clothing while you were away. The way you looked at my socks, you expected me to stay behind when you went to the station. There are not any photographs in your case, nor are there any interesting books."

"They have a library at the school, Sherlock."

"Yes, but it is not the same. I keep my favourite books in my room, and you know they are my favourite because you see them there and not on the shelf." Sherlock's fingers pick at the hem of his sleeve.

It takes three minutes and forty eight more seconds for Sherlock to deduce that Mycroft doesn't want to bring any reminders of home with him because he doesn't want to be reminded of home. After that Sherlock has run out of words, though he tries to figure out why it seems so wrong for Mycroft to leave all of his books behind.

...

Mycroft'so first letter arrives two months into term. It is addressed to his parents. It is also incredibly dull, containing sentences about the school's library, headmaster, grounds and faculty. For good measure he includes a mention of his coursework. He writes "how is Sherlock?" Then writes a few more sentences about his schoolmates.

There is no letter to Sherlock. The entire letter was for Sherlock, it simply wasn't addressed to him.

...

Each time Mycroft returns from school, he looks more like a stranger to Sherlock. 

With every return trip to school, Mycroft searches for someone who has a mind like his own.

...

Their mother is hanging ornaments on the tree when Sherlock appears at the bottom of the staircase. Mycroft has been home for two hours and fifteen minutes.

Every jumper fits Sherlock incorrectly, he is ten and his body is skin stretched over bone. There is nothing to him except ankles sticking out under trouser hems, pale forearms and eyes that could cut down the sky. 

Later, Mycroft looks at his younger brother during Christmas dinner and knows that another equation has solved itself. They are equals, and while there may someday be another person like them, similarity will not be enough.

"I don't understand why we put up the tree, you and father believe in science." Sherlock's voice is petulant, he has pine sap on his wrist and is scratching at it with a fingernail.

"It's a nice sentiment dear." Their mother answers, putting rolls down at the end of the table.

"Sentiment is a chemical defect found in the losing side." Mycroft has the words out automatically, and he watches the fallout as his brain predicts it for him.

Sherlock blinks, places his palms flat on the table and rises to leave. Asking to be excused as he pivots toward the doorway and beelines for the stairs. Their parents are both still at the table, mother scowling and father quiet. Mycroft stands and nods at father before exiting the room.

He finds Sherlock standing in his room, looking at the suitcase he hadn't bothered unpacking.

"Do your classmates even know you?" Sherlock fumes quietly.


	2. Envelopes smudged with graphite.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock Holmes, age ten. Mycroft Holmes, age seventeen.

Mycroft spends much of the day out. He leaves the house early in the morning, just before all the shops open up. Sherlock is still asleep. Their parents are awake, dressed in worn flannel nightshirts with matching trousers. Mycroft politely declines toast but accepts the cuppa his mother places on the counter in front of him. He is home for the short gap between end of winter term and start of spring. 

Sherlock sleeps like the dead, a fact that has never changed in all the time Mycroft has known his brother. It is a handy habit that allows Mycroft the chance to pack his suitcase and place it gently in the bottom of Sherlock's cuboard.

When the eldest Holmes brother returns, it is with a paper sack containing a wrapped parcel. Sherlock makes just enough noise at the foot of the stairs for Mycroft to know he is being summoned. Still, he stalls. Chats with his parents about the rain that is expected later in the evening. As he turns toward the stairs his mother reminds him that dinner will be ready soon.

Sherlock is in Mycroft's room, sitting on the floor in a tangle of limb and knitwear. 

"You hid your suitcase." Sherlock's fingers are plucking at the hem of one sleeve.  
"You found it." It is not a question. Sherlock nods in response.

They both take too long coming up with something more to say. Mycroft watches his brother rise from the floor and ease past him into the hallway. He only knows to follow from the slight tug on his sleeve. He follows his brother into Sherlock's bedroom. The suitcase is on the bed, every item inside had been pulled out and arranged on the comforter, Sherlock's cupboard door left haphazardly ajar.

Mycroft doesn't smile, but his eyebrow lifts.  
"How long did it take you to find it?"  
"Fifteen minutes. You hid it in my bedroom."  
"Obvious."  
"Sentiment is a chemical defect found in the losing side."

...

Sherlock receives a package in the post, two weeks after Mycroft had repacked his suitcase and boarded the train for school.

The handwriting on the mailing address is generic looking, effecient, legible and orderly. The only trace of flourish is where Mycroft had written his younger brother's name. This is how Sherlock knows, without doubt, that this package is from Mycroft. It is strange, the stiff paper wrapping and standard issue twine parcel. Sitting on the kitchen table, capturing Sherlock's attention by looking so exceptionally unassuming.

Neither his mother or father are home, which suits the youngest Holmes brother just fine. He holds the parcel under one arm as he walks through the ground floor. Sherlock's boots love smears of mud across the floor, it's concentrated by the kitchen counter top and the front door. He toes off his shoes at the bottom of the staircase.

The feeling of wet denim against his ankles is immediately irritating to Sherlock, and he wrenches his dresser drawer open long enough to lay hands on a dry pair of trousers. His initial intent had been to go into Mycroft's room and open the book, it has to be a book, in the midst of his brother's things. As it is, Sherlock is frustrated at the idea of putting the parcel down long enough to change trousers and tug off his jumper.

Clad in a thin long sleeve shirt and dry trousers, Sherlock scoops the parcel under his arm again and makes his way into Mycroft's room. He is chilled as he closes the door behind himself, nerves on edge at the idea of waiting a second longer to open the parcel. Sherlock exhales, calming a bit. Mycroft's room is always neat, impossibly tidy by virtue of belonging to someone who was rarely present enough to fully occupy it. The residue of the oldest Holmes brother stayed in the space like a persistent shadow. 

Sherlock closes the closet door after selecting a jumper, already midway through the action of pulling it over his head when the front door opens and shuts. The sound of the footsteps suggests his mother's arrival. Sherlock glances at Mycroft's bedroom door, making sure it is closed.

In the three years Mycroft has been away at school, Sherlock has never been disturbed if he was in his brother's bedroom with the door closed. It had taken longer than it should have for Sherlock to notice the pattern. Forty six hours had passed between Sherlock saying a stumbling goodbye to his older brother and the moment when he first decided to leave the surreal echoes of his Mycroft's bedroom.

In all that time Sherlock was careful to never bring anything of his into Mycroft's bedroom. Sherlock had a bedroom of his own, to store books and whatever interested him. Still, he often went into his brother's room because it was quieter and easier to think. Except for now, though in a way the parcel didn't violate the rule, as Mycroft had to have bought the book before giving it to Sherlock. Anything else was theft.

The twine was a simple knot, the paper fastened with cellophane tape. Underneath the exterior wrapping was a heavier layer of brown paper wrap, folded over the book but not taped down. Sherlock eased the wrappings off carefully, spotting the fingerprint left in the tape. The book was large, a hardcover. Opening the cover and flipping to the first few pages Sherlock confirmed that this was not a first edition, but a re-print of a very common text. The title of the book was "Gray's Anatomy." 

...

Mycroft is studying in the library when a student from his dormitory hall slides into the wooden chair across the table from him. The boy is younger than Mycroft, refusing to meet the older student's eyes and unable to hold still for longer than a few seconds. The boy places an envelope onto the worn tabletop, nudging the envelope until it touches the book Mycroft is currently pouring over.

In a glance the eldest Holmes brother knows the letter is from Sherlock. There are graphite smudges across the back of the envelope, and it has been filled to bursting with paper. Before he opens it, Mycroft removes his own copy of "Gray's Anatomy" from his book bag and closes the text on the table in front of him. Mycroft pushes it aside to make room for Sherlock's letter, which contains eight pages of his brother's thoughts.


	3. Surface at the base of Big Ben.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The relationship between the Holmes siblings is a very complicated thing to portray. (Please note that their relationship does not contain romantic elements.)

They do not exchange letters often. Still, every envelope that comes scrawled with Sherlock's untidy penmanship is filled with sheets of lined paper. Mycroft values the letters from his brother in the way he values his copy of "Gray's Anatomy." The letters are a link to someone with the potential to best him, or at least to understand. It is sometimes painful, reading the subtext between Sherlock's inked words. 

Mycroft knows that his brother is alone, lonely without being able to recognize the signs for himself. Mycroft's letters are as long as the oldest Holmes brother can manage them. Eventually, Mycroft can no longer talk about his classes or classmates. Instead he writes his brother about the grounds and the trips he takes to London on the weekends.

...

Sherlock doesn't expect his brother to return home for summer holiday. While it is never mentioned outright, the youngest Holmes can read distraction and purpose in every line of the text Mycroft sends him. The letters have shifted, from ink on composition book paper to ink on unlined stationary. The most recent one, telling Sherlock to wish their parents a happy summer comes from a typewriter. It is printed on generic stationery, sent business class through the post.

The youngest Holmes deuces it from the floor of Mycroft's bedroom.

...

Mycroft takes an advanced political sciences course over summer holiday, in addition to a psychology course. He interns with a cubicle full of political science majors and cuffs his shirt sleeves below his elbows as the other male interns do. He is the youngest in the room by eighteen months, so he leaves a calculated amount of stubble on his jaw and waits for the worst. Nobody asks his age, though he is ready with an answer if something like that happened.

It doesn't. Instead, Mycroft Holmes is called into a woman's office the last week of the summer internship program. The woman offers a chair which Mycroft politely declines. She pushes a folder across a mostly-tidy desktop and nods at Mycroft to take it. He does, opening the folder to find a well written letter of recommendation from several senior staff members in addition to a transfer request document. The transfer request has been signed by the woman in front of him, but nowhere is it written where Mycroft is to transfer into.

"I have read up on you." Mycroft is distracted by her bracelet and the indent of a wedding ring she doesn't have on.  
"What conclusion did you arrive at?" 

The woman behind the desk grins, and it's good natured enough that Mycroft suddenly sees the data fall into place. She is having an affair, he knows. The same way he knows that it must be with her personal assistant, and that she doesn't wear her wedding ring because it is easier to hide her marriage from a pool of seasonal interns than it is to hide her affair.

"I feel your talent is being wasted here, Mr. Holmes. Though I have no doubt that you should finish your studies and attend university, I would like to see you placed in a more challenging program in the future."  
"Thank you."  
"Do you have anything to say for yourself? Any preference as to where you are placed?"

Mycroft had watched Sherlock deduce the postman, grocery clerk, off-duty policeman and dozens of other strangers in the course of four years. Each reaction was the same, awe at the ability of a child to unearth their secrets and immediately after that, fear of the intelligence Sherlock weilded without second thought. Mycroft hasn't spoken a deduction out loud since leaving for his first term at school.

"Where do you keep your wedding ring?" 

...

Mycroft spends his last year at boarding school writing essays for scholarship programs and taking advanced courses in psychology, economics, political sciences and communications. He keeps his best suits at home, hanging neatly in a cupboard where only Sherlock sees them. He makes it a mission to get on first name basis with the Dean of the school. It happens rather abruptly, after walking into the Dean's office and seeing a duffel bag sitting innocently beside the desk.

Mycroft knows, something. It sparks against the common mechanisms in his mind, urging him to pay attention. Not for the first time in his life, Mycroft wishes Sherlock were present. His brother's presence has always pushed him to be better. Then it slides into place, the data and the detail. 

"Sir, are you planning a holiday?"  
Mycroft already knows the answer, but the three seconds of bewilderment on the Dean's face solidify his train of thought.

...

The oldest Holmes brother deduces his teachers by the clothing they wear and the cars they drive onto campus every morning. He deduces the office clerks by the way they keep their desks and the accessories that flash on their cuffs and wrists, the students in his classes by their shoes and the hems of their trousers. Mycroft has noticed for years, but only now is the information becoming useful. 

He builds himself the smallest of networks and uses it to get seven internship offers in different governmental organizations.

...

Sherlock is waiting for him, sitting in his own bedroom instead of Mycroft's. 

The youngest Holmes brother is a thin, pale, eleven year old. Mycroft notices the clothing that Sherlock wears, button down shirts tucked into unbelted trousers. None of it is actually Mycroft's, thought the similarity to the clothing hanging in his room is unmistakable. Mycroft stands in a great coat and leather loafers, filling the doorway to Sherlock's bedroom in a way he hasn't before.

They have exchanged words, many of them, in letters. Some of Sherlock's more interesting letters are tucked in Mycroft's suitcase. All of Mycroft's letters are wedged onto Sherlock's dresser, held down by a worn copy of "Gray's Anatomy." They share the space with other things, a scatter of books, an assortment of beakers and a folded map of the London underground. Despite all the things they can say in ink, the Holmes siblings let silence become their first greeting.

Once the moment passes, Sherlock meets his brother's eyes and asks.  
"When do you plan to leave?"  
Mycroft doesn't allow his face to shift expression.  
"I start in two and a half weeks, they've sorted the housing for us."

...

Sherlock sends three letters that summer. Mycroft makes time to read them all, but is at a loss for how to respond. So he falls back on an old habit, writing a letter for his parents and trusting that word will reach his brother in due time. By the time he puts it in the post, business class, Sherlock's letter is a worn, creased piece of paper in the pocket of his breifcase.

...

Mycroft takes a look around his flat two days before the internship program ends. The lease is up in a week, giving him time to move out. However, Sherlock is expected to arrive by train in three days. For all he has written to Sherlock about London, the youngest Holmes has never set foot inside city limits without one of his parents. Mycroft knows that it is an obvious ploy to spend quality time with his brother.

...

The flat had come sparsely furnished for two people. Sherlock notices, the moment he glances into the flat's single bedroom, that Mycroft had purchased a second set of bedding specifically for him. There is an assortment of maps on the coffee table, which draws Sherlock's attention. The youngest Holmes brother is on his knees, fingers tracing tube lines and mouthing the names of museums when Mycroft comes to stand two feet from him.

"Where do you want to go?"

...

Mycroft had gone out with his fellow interns on occasion, when the lines around their eyes suggested that he was falling out of their social graces. His bosses had never minded that he stayed late at the office instead of heading out with the other interns. He avoided drinking in front of his fellow interns, letting the sleep deprivation and inconsistent eating schedule blur the cities lights before his eyes. The effect, he reasoned, was similar.

During the work week, Mycroft's impression of London was smooth lines and an ageless river, the whole thing cast in stone and wrapped in enough metal to hold it together. This London was regal, complicated but something that could be tamed.

Sherlock sets down his duffel bag, pockets a map off the coffee table and goes out to meet the city as if it were alive. Mycroft follows his brother down into the tube station and waits beside him on the underground until it reaches Westminster station. He watches Sherlock pause for a moment, looking around at all of the possible exits. Mycroft allows his fingertips to brush Sherlock's shoulder blade, and it startles his brother into following him.

They surface at the base of Big Ben. Mycroft has only used this access point a handful of times, but it is different watching Sherlock react to it. There is less metal and more sky in the youngest Holmes brother's eye color. They walk the city, Sherlock meandering down the tourist-y sections of street as if obligated before hauling off toward the more domestic portions of the city. They walk for three hours before Mycroft insists on an early dinner.

Sherlock has led the both into a fairly residential section of the city, nothing too posh, which seems fortunate. Mycroft orders enough food for three, and asks the server to box the leftovers for them. It is an excuse to point Sherlock in the direction of his flat. While Mycroft knows his younger brother isn't pleased at the idea of sleeping when there is so much more city left to explore... Mycroft has already seen more of London today than he managed to during the course of his internship.

...

Mycroft wakes early, by habit. He finds Sherlock asleep, sprawled across the sofa with the newly purchased comforter half on the floor. Mycroft makes tea, uses the large mugs and leaves the liquid black. His kitchen is tidy enough that Sherlock would have no trouble locating either sugar or milk. The leftovers from dinner sit inside the fridge, occupying their own shelf. By the time Mycroft returns with Sherlock's tea, his brother is awake.

Everything shifts just a fraction to the left of center. The curtains are wide open, Sherlock's hair is a disordered mess, there has not been any food in the flat for weeks, all of the products in the bathroom are generic. Mycroft suddenly feels underdressed in Sherlock's presence. The oldest Holmes registers the warm chaos of his brother, watches Sherlock tuck an unreasonably thin ankle under a cotton clad leg. He presses the mug of tea into Sherlock's hands.

"You love London." Mycroft doesn't phrase it as a question.  
"You know the answer to that."  
"Where would you like to go today?" It is as close to diplomatic as Mycroft wants to get.  
"Why did you ask me to come here? You don't own enough to make moving difficult, and you haven't even started to pack."

Mycroft sits in the chair on the other side of the coffee table, it feels better somehow, than standing while speaking. He isn't sure what to do about his ankles, wonders why, during all of the meetings he has sat through he had never been concerned for his ankles before. Mycroft settles for crossing one over his knee.

"I promised to show you London."  
"No you didn't, you said I should see it. Tell me the truth." Sherlock's eyes flicker over the furniture in the living room before glancing down the hall toward the bedroom. Mycroft sees the moment Sherlock registers that Mycroft has not invited anyone into the flat. Sherlock's eyebrows knit together before relaxing.  
"There was no reason to bring anyone back to my flat, not with my work schedule."  
"Mummy would be scandalized."

Sherlock's nostrils flair out as the corner of his mouth quirks. It's laughter, Mycroft recognizes it as a measure of guilt sparks in his chest.

"I missed you. None of the interns were half as capable as you, and they were oblivious to everything in front of them."  
"Don't." Sherlock's face is blank, half lit by the sun from the window.

Mycroft knows where this conversation leads, not because it is familiar, but because it is inevitable. Something cracks across the air, and Mycroft shakes off the residue of the person he was forced to be in order to appease the expectations of people considered his peers. Sherlock Holmes is the only peer Mycroft recognizes. As such, he owes his brother truth.

"I wrote you." Mycroft keeps the sentence flat, empty.  
"You left. Got on the train for school and kept leaving."  
"I came back for the-"  
"Holidays. Until your internships and your class work kept you away."

This truth will become theirs, Mycroft knows. The same way he knew about the Dean's divorce and his bosses affair and which of the interns on the floor was going to resign before the end of the program. The details fall into order and the data solves itself.

"I care for you a great deal Sherlock."  
"Caring is not an advantage." 

Sherlock speaks to his tea, eyes shadowed by unruly hair and cheekbones just beginning to show. He is eleven years old, built like a fey creature from myth, brutal as a switchblade. Mycroft wants to stay seated, invite Sherlock to apply his weaponized intellect to the task of dissecting the rest of him. Instead, Mycroft rises from his chair.

"Wake me if you're going to leave the flat." Mycroft calls over his shoulder as he makes his way down the hall.

He closes the bedroom door and wraps back up in his blankets. Down the hall, Sherlock sleeps.


	4. Thirteen and twenty.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock, age thirteen. Mycroft, age twenty.

At thirteen years old, Sherlock stands in his math professor's office. He is a collection of limbs, eclectic bruises and stormy intelligence. The tips of his fingers are perpetually stained with chemicals he lifts from the science supply cuboards. 

The youngest Holmes brother is four months into his first year at boarding school. His mother pulled him from his previous school three weeks before the year ended, after the Dean of students threatened Sherlock with expulsion. Mycroft appeared one weekend with a file of information about schools more suited to Sherlock's manic curiosity.

The professor leans forward in his chair and carefully examines the student in front of him. Sherlock clasps his hands behind his back and tries to hold still, tilts his head to the side and inhales through his nose.

The math professor slides a piece of grid paper across the surface of his desk. It catches Sherlock's eye immediately, holds all of his focus for one breathtaking second. (The professor is older than the average age of the teaching staff employed at the school, by a rather wide margin. His desk is neat, battered but clean. Data unspoiled from a film reel in his head and it suddenly stops. Blissfully quiet in the face of a single piece of paper.)

"What is it?"  
Sherlock is thrown enough to ask something obvious, chides himself as the words leave his mouth.  
"Solve it and find out."

...

Mycroft solves the first cipher Sherlock sends to him without taking a second glance at the paper. The puzzle had been tucked into the envelope along with a letter about chemical metal embrittlement penned on smudged paper.

The oldest Holmes brother resorts to opening personal mail within the confines of his flat. He reads and re-reads the letter Sherlock sent before burning it. From the letter he learns two things, the chemicals Sherlock is most likely to steal from the science supply cuboard, and that his brother has a talent for cryptology.

...

Mycroft lives in an empty flat, provided by whichever organization he is being employed by while he completes his thesis papers. (He's been passed around a few departments and eventually worked into the position of secretary for someone within the edges of the intelligence agency.) Between tidy shelves of books and a polished unassuming wardrobe, Mycroft stores the groundwork for his ever-expanding network of contacts.

He keeps names, phone numbers and addresses, job titles. Nothing so incriminating as blackmail materials, not when all he needs to do is see to understand. He makes note of whom owes who and why. He learns how loyalty can and cannot be earned, bought and exploited.

He learned about a former MI analyst who retired gracefully and worked at a boarding school north of London. So he forged a letter of complaint from some concerned parents and bribed the Dean of students to threaten Sherlock with expulsion. It took three days to figure out where the analyst teaches.

...

Mycroft wants nothing more than to send Sherlock the drafts of his thesis papers. He sends the outline of one, a work about nuances in meaning shared between languages and the broad spectrum similarity between languages when talking about technical concepts or mechanical operations.

The other is a more sensitive topic. (An analysis of the cost/benefit of compartmentalized intelligence operations.) 

...

Sherlock arrives home two days before Mycroft. The house smells like winter and old library books.

Neither mother or father are home when Mycroft finally crosses the threshold. They are out, and Sherlock has taken to occupying the living room. A familiar, battered copy of Gray's Anatomy sits on the coffee table. (The data aligns itself. The book has always been Sherlock's tangible connection to Mycroft, a visual reminder of their dynamic. The empty house and sudden nova of scattered focus, Sherlock's confusion in the absence of information.)


End file.
